I
saw a “news” story asking the question, “Could Earth defend itself from an ET
invasion?”
Overlooking
the fact that there would be no realistic reason for the aliens to invade
because everything they would want could be found elsewhere in the Solar System,
except, of course for our “Earth-like” environment and the life found here, the
answer to the question is, “NO!”
I
remember one of the science fiction writers, I think Jerry Pournelle or Larry
Niven, but it might have been Harlan Ellison, say, “All they would have to do
is stand back and throw rocks at us.”
What
that meant, simply, was that an alien race that wanted to invade could soften
us up by dropping asteroids on us. Think of all the documentaries that have
aired in the last ten years that tell us about “asteroid apocalypse.” An
asteroid some 300 feet in diameter (or something about (100 meters) would do
incredible damage. Move to something about a half mile, and continents
disappear, the global climate would be shot for centuries, and billions would
perish.
Go
much larger than that and you have an extinction level event. Pushing asteroids
around wouldn’t be all that difficult for a spacefaring race. And rather than
pushing a dinosaur killer (yes, I know that the dinosaurs probably weren’t extinguished
by an asteroid, but the term is great) into an orbit that would collide with
Earth, they could push hundreds of smaller ones into that orbit. It could turn
out to be carpet bombing the world with no danger to themselves.
The
point is that given our current technology, we simply couldn’t reach out to
touch them. If they are inside of the orbit of the moon, then we could shoot at
them, but our chemical rockets would be moving slowly enough that they could
intercept and destroy them regardless of how many we launched and right now
there aren’t all that many when talking interstellar war.
Or,
they could just move out of the way.
Or,
throw rocks at the missiles.
So,
if the aliens wished to invade, given our current technology, they would win.
If they decided they needed to occupy Earth, they certainly could do that as
well, but why expose themselves to our retaliation. Why not just sit there in
orbit and dictate their terms to us? If we chose to fight back, throw another
rock.
Strategically
speaking, they have no motivation to engage in a fight especially one on the
planet’s surface. Independence Day
never dealt with that question. “V”
in its various incarnations did, to a degree… the “visitors” wanted to engage
in some sort of trade or communication with a hidden agenda. Damon Knight’s
story, “To Serve Man,” (which also a Twilight Zone episode) dealt with the
reason for a landing rather than an invasion. But, at least there was a reason
for the contact.
But
without any additional reason, they have no motivation to land or to invade. If
we launched something into orbit to attack them, they could withdraw to the
orbit of, say, Saturn, and it would take us years to get there. They could
evade us simply. And then attack at their leisure.
In
the end, the answer to the question is that he who controls the high ground wins
the battle. We can’t actually fight a
battle in space, which means the aliens have the high ground. Or… as was
learned in the Iraq war, Iraqi tanks could engage at one mile. The problem? The
Abrams tanks could engage at two miles. In other words, they could stand out of
range of the Iraqis and destroy their armor. Such is the situation we would
face with the aliens in orbit. We couldn’t successfully engage and we would
lose.
38 comments:
Good fences make good neighbors. Fences a few light years thick make real good neighbors.
Throwing rocks at us from space is rather crude and destructive. If the aliens are most interested in Earth's genetic diversity, it would be much easier to take out the human race and leave the rest of the biosphere untouched using a engineered, highly contagious, highly virulent virus that affects only humans. Disperse it simultaneously all over the world and by the time we knew what hit us it would be too late to do anything about it.
A kinder and gentler invasion, but much longer in length, would be an invasion of the body snatchers. Genetically engineer alien-human hybrids that physiologically are like us and look like us, but mentally are more like them. Think of them as homo sapien version 7.0 to replace the old, more destructive homo sapien ver. 6.21, now well underway to destroying our planet in a hundred different ways.
Replacement alien humans could be gradually implanted all over the world and eventually take over, pushing the old version out. You wouldn't even necessarily notice that an invasion was going on and our version of humanity was being gradually wiped out.
Thankfully the Colorado Commission conclusion, that UFOs do not represent a threat to national security appears to be correct ( with threat defined as intent + capability.
I am rather sceptical of the idea that 'the boys topside' might be engaged in genetic modification of humans. Unless such modification produced a significant survival advantage then it wouldn't tend to be selected for and there are no indications of such a mutant strain of humans. Given the overall growth in the human population the maths doesn't work without a strong selection effect.
I am less sceptical than I used to be about the basic existence of CE4 type events, given the statistical correlation of CE4 events and UFO reports and various theoretical developments which mean thT the very idea of humanoid like aliens can no longer be rejected as impossible, but understanding the intent of any operations that may be underway is quite hard.
One set of effects, focusing only on a subset of cases with unusually good data ( not CEevents) is that cases often involve an approach towards a target of interest such as a plane or sensitive installation, a manoeuvre which suggests a high performance or high technical abilities followed by a rapid departure. The net effect is a transfer of information. We become aware that we would be basically defenceless if the situation changed whilst they, assuming this isn't some currently not understood interaction of atmospheric plasmas with our technology, gAin data on our current capabilities, procedures and reactions.
This is of course extremely speculative
What do you mean by "the dinosaurs probably weren't extinguished by an asteroid.."? For quite some time, the impact theory has been well established. There is evidence for considerable pre-impact extinction but only in western North America.
Btw I take it you don't believe the reverse engineering and shoot down stories. Taken at face value they suggest we would stand a chance. It may sound far fetched but if the government really has had access to alien materials and technology for 66 years, by now they might've devised some secret means of dealing with an invader.
Starman -
I think the asteroid theory taking out the dinosaurs is not as nearly as accepted as you might think. Many recent documentaries have begun to qualify the statement and Robert Bakker is a proponent of the disease theory. I just wanted to make sure that everyone knew that I was aware of the controversy.
David -
Take a look at Independence Day which the aliens come down and rain destruction on many cities while exposing themselves to retaliation. Throwing rocks (while crude) would have been much safer for them.
My point was that there is nothing on Earth they could want that wasn't available in other areas of the Solar System except for the varieties of life found here. If tht was their interest, then throwing rocks would not be the best solution... unless, of course, you wished to prove your power over us.
All -
The answer to the question remains that we couldn't defend against a spacefaring race because their technology and their position on the "high ground" renders our defensive capabilities as inadequate.
Bakker's theory is ancient history. I first read THE DINOSAUR HERESIES in the '80s. The "disease" (actually biogeographic chaos) theory isn't much good, in part because there is no evidence for an influx of nonAmerican dinosaurs in the "moribund" Lancian ecosystem. Furthermore, there is now evidence that dino diversity remained high outside western North America, notably in western Europe near the end. Btw the volcanic and regression hypotheses aren't much good either.
In fact, there is something here that isn't available elsewhere in the solar system or perhaps not in one star system in a million--a perfectly habitable planet. If their goal is expansion and colonization, it would be much easier to just takeover good planets instead of just terraforming inhospitable ones. But to live here it may be essential to acquire some of our genes.
The danger of the hybrid infiltration tactic is that some of the operatives -- living as humans -- might think of themselves as human and might side with the Earth.
I'm not a sci-fi buff but it is a narrative inevitability. No doubt others could provide titles from TV, movies, comics and novels. (I can only think of Superman and Spock. They are not perfect analogies but their split heritage is a source of inner conflict for them.)
Terry,
The hybrids might feel more human than alien, but the alien overloads cleverly have tiny explosive implants that can be triggered if the hybrids try to go native.
I would have to agree with Anthony, however, that the aliens better step up the hybrid program, because right now the rabble seem to be badly out-reproducing the supposedly superior hybrid replacements. Of course, a properly engineered lethal virus that the hybrids are naturally made immune to will take care of that problem.
Or maybe the hybrids wouldn't want to totally destroy the humans, just most of them. Better to still have cheap labor around and live at the top of the heap.
Hmmm, sounds pretty much like the world we already have.
All sorts of sci-fi stories suggest themselves.
a history lesson:
...perhaps the best 'rock-throwing' sci-fi novel was penned by a Naval Academy grad who also happened to help those two kids, Niven and Pournelle, by rewriting their messy manuscript for 'A Mote in God's Eye', when all they had asked for was a little advice on their plot...
...the novel this old guy wrote about orbital rock weapons was called 'The Moon is a Harsh Mistress', which is likely best known for adding the term TANSTAAFL to the american version of english.
Oh....the gentleman author was Robert Heinlein, a somewhat successful writer, and someone who Karl Pflock (who claimed to be a successful sci-fi writer himself) (!!!) claimed to me he had been best friends with, all AFTER Heinlein's death in 1988, of course...
...perhaps that is why I have always thought of Pflock as the Frank Kaufmann of Roswell skeptics.
Terry the censor said:
"The danger of the hybrid infiltration tactic is that some of the operatives -- living as humans -- might think of themselves as human and might side with the Earth."
This concern should be part of the program. These genetic changes, or let's call it 'hybridization program' should include some modifications of human feelings such as aggressiveness, and tribal (gang) welfare tendencies. Of course, this decrease of aggressiveness should (I hope) be also a spontaneus trend of the naturally evolving humanity. E.g., most people don't want anymore wars between countries. Most people believe that war has no sense at all. Nevertheless, a 'hybrid' program should include enhanced pacifist features and more willingness to accept different type of beings as brothers. This sounds like a new age cliche idea of brotherhood and bla-bla, but the unfair part of it would be that these brotherhood feelings would be implanted genetically into humans.
Hey! Why am I giving ideas to the invaders?
Anthony Mugan wrote:
"Given the overall growth in the human population the maths doesn't work without a strong selection effect."
I believe actual humanity is not subjected to the typical selection forces than other animals. Modern medicine makes the weaker more able to survive and procreate than thousands or millions of years in the past. Thus, make the genetic or "hybridization" change slightly beneficial or even neutral and it will have all warranty to persist in time, and worst, to disseminate to the next breeding generations. See the real math involved:
pure human with pure human ---> pure human son
hybrid with pure human ---> hybrid son
pure human with hybrid ---> hybrid son
hybrid with hybrid ---> hybrid son
Scary eh?
Maybe aggressiveness and ruthlessness got us to the top of the food chain, but now it is destroying us with the world brimming with people. We are dying an environmental slow death through overpopulation, global destruction of habitats, plus global warming.
On top of that, we now have the technology to quickly destroy ourselves, whether it be by nuclear war or a pandemic spread rapidly around the globe by ubiquitous jet travel.
So if you are somewhat benevolent aliens trying to actually preserve some aspect of humanity plus the global environment before it is totally destroyed, repopulating with an improved version of homo sapien, who might also possess certain alien qualities needed for long-term survival. Thus, less aggressive, less paranoid, less selfish humans, less apt to engage in tribal warfare and more apt to cooperate with one another.
It wouldn't hurt to have other attributes that would give you a big advantage over most of the wild humans, such as better health (mental and physical), better physical appearance, greater intelligence and enhanced mind-reading capabilities. If someone knows exactly what you are thinking, you are at a distinct disadvantage. You can't lie, deceive, hide your plans or intentions. The hybrids would rise to the top in all phases of human endeavor, whether business, science, politics, or whatever.
So maybe you don't need to totally wipe out the old humans, but place the hybrids in positions of power all over the planet. A mass dying of the old humans would speed up the transition to a new order, say with a global pandemic targeted at the old humans but for which the hybrids would be immune.
Time to move to Pitcairn Island.
Hi
This probably isn't the place for an in depth discussion on natural selection. I would simply encourage those who feel that CE4 events may be aimed at a hybridisation programme for the human race to study the relevant literature as that idea falls apart on even quite a cursory examination.
I do agree with the comment above that human society has a level of protection against traditional factors involved in natural selection such as disease, hunger etc. but these are:
a) variable in extent geographically (e.g. less developed nations)
b) not 100% eliminated (and may become more effective in the future if anti-biotic resistance continues to increase, for example)
c) May to some extent be being replaced by other selection factors that impact on the number of offspring.
We do run the risk of attempting to interpret the purpose of any operations that may be underway in terms of our current world views and within the limits of what we can imagine technically. Up to the early 20th century such events were often interpreted in supernatural terms, moving into technological frames of reference thereafter. The view on CE4 events developed in the 1980's seems very grounded in what at that time seemed like very cutting edge technology, which is already looking rather out of date (e.g. with the advent of synthetic biology).
I suppose the bottom line is that thankfully we don't seem to have worry about it too much at the moment.
Throwing rock could have come from Heinlein's 'the moon is a harsh mistress'. Heinlein calculated that shucking rocks would have about the same explosive effect as an A-bomb (circa 1950s) without the ionizing radiation. The book posited electro-propulsion catapults accelerating multi-ton metal jacketed payloads into Hohmann S-trajectories towards earth. Of course such catapults would work much better in the moon's 1/6th gravity and no atmosphere. The trajectories were timed and calculated by the lunar penal colony's master computer which became self-aware due to a critical mass of components.
A good yarn, all in all.
ice9
"Throwing rock could have come from Heinlein's 'the moon is a harsh mistress'. Heinlein calculated that shucking rocks would have about the same explosive effect as an A-bomb (circa 1950s) without the ionizing radiation."
To put some numbers on it, something "dropped" from the moon falls to Earth and attains an escape velocity of about 25,000 mph or 11 km/sec. At that speed, the mass of an object needed to have a kinetic energy equal to that of an A-bomb is around 1000 tons. That is about the mass of a fully-loaded space shuttle or two or three Boeing 747's or a rock 10-15 feet in diameter (depending on density).
The meteor at Chelyabinsk earlier this year exploded with the force of roughly 30 A-bombs. It was estimated to have weighed about 10 times more and traveled 70% faster than the above (hence the greater kinetic energy). Had it exploded directly over the city instead of ~30 miles away, the city and its inhabitants would have been destroyed.
The energy of the explosion was calculated from the strength of distant sound waves recorded at ground detectors thousands of miles away. From there, and knowing the approximate density of the meteor from ground fragments, it is physics 101 to calculate the approximate size and speed.
(As usual, there is a Roswell connection, since the balloon project, Mogul, allegedly responsible for Roswell according to the skeptoids, was the first attempt to detect distant A-bomb explosions from sound waves. Then it was discovered the sound waves of such distant, large explosions could be detected on the ground, rendering such balloon flights unnecessary.)
Some good skull-sweat went into this book, same with most of his others.
Building such a catapult on earth had some special problems. He thought using a high mountain range near the equator could work. The end of the catapult would have to have an upward curve to punch through the least amount of atmosphere in order to achieve escape velocity without rocket assist.
In the story, the loonies built two such catapults underground. They were straight since there was no need to compensate for atmospheric drag. Since it was possible for scientists on earth to accurately determine the origin point on the moon, one catapult was destroyed. And just when earth thought it was safe, another batch of rocks was sent. Earth granted independence to the loonies and since the last batch was fitted with rocket units, it was possible to change the trajectories and drop the rocks on uninhabited areas.
%^)
A cubic yard of solid, let's say granite, weighs around 4000 lbs. so how is it possible a rock of "10 to 15 feet in diameter" would weigh 2 million lbs ("1000 tons")?? A 15 x 15 x 15 foot piece of rock would be about 500,000 lbs.
An iron meteorite would be much denser than granite, however.
Too hurried a calculation and I stand corrected. Radii rather than diameters of 10-15 feet would take energies into A-bomb size.
Hiroshima-size bomb about 6*10^13 Joules. Low-density rock, 2.5 gm/cm^3, traveling 11 km/sec, 15-foot radius would give energy of about 6*10^13 J. 10-foot radius, 8 gm/cm^3 rock like nickel-iron meteorite, would also be about 6*10^13 J.
Sounds great, until you calculate the energy to lift rocks of this size to escape velocity off the moon to "drop" them on the Earth. You need nearly 5% of the energy they obtain falling to Earth or 5% of the energy of an A-bomb or about 3*10^12 J, or about the energy released in the collapse of the twin World Trade Centers of about 2.4*10^12 J.
All -
Do you all realize that a spacefaring race would not be launching the rocks from the moon's surface, but diverting Earth crossing asteroids to do the dirty work... a much simplier process than building a machine on the moon to do it.
The absolute simplest way to destroy or cripple the human race with minimal damage to the rest of the planet is with a highly lethal, contagious virus.
They might be able to eliminate us without a virus or impacts. Look at evidence for mind control. Just have us kill ourselves. Btw earth crossing asteroids might not be big enough to finish us; maybe something from the asteroid zone. But why mess up the environment when they can just kill us?
What truly blows my mind is the obviousness conveyed solely through imagery.
Have these so called "ETs" EVER actually done anything, or provided the least amount of substantial evidence, for what is their PERCEIVED advantageous position? None that I am aware of.
As far as I am concerned, ET seems utterly powerless apart from the feigned appearance of magic tricks that make us think they are
"advanced".
BTW, what's the precise difference between a shape shifting UFO and a skinwalker?
We literally have books for how their propulsion systems function based solely on observations of them.
100% speculative.
We are taught by the "ETs" how and why precisely they are interested in us, via the imagery contained within the Abduction Phenomenon.
100% speculative.
We are also taught via the UFO community's subculture that "ETs" supposedly utilize fallible "Hardware".
100% speculation.
Humanoid Encounters seem to demonstrate hypothetically on a one to one or few basis, that these beings are completely deception oriented, wherein they utilize the subjective mind of the witness to appeal to a sentient level of familiarity much a like a chameleon would in the wild, when hiding from, or predaciously pursuing, other community members.
The ONLY thing that seems to correlate across the board with respect to UFOs is that these "alien" phenomena take place, and all subsequent relative orientation is taken from, the mind of the observer.
We have NEVER witnessed a real known technological edge. All we have is imagery. I think it's about time we focus on the actual stage where 100% of the UFO activity actually takes place, within out consciousness.
In this sense, the study of consciousness would so logically over shadow and weigh the notion of what is a UFO, to the effect that they, UFOs themselves, might be more so likened to a grain of sand on the beach of human reality with respect for possibilities.
IMO, UFOs do NOT navigate space time. They navigate what we call "reality".
(BTW, where is the evidence from our observations of UFOs to support the notion of "space travel" in the sense that we are familiar with it, anyhow?)
Jeff, surely you've heard of Malmstrom. Shutting down our ICBMs is suggestive of an advantageous position, as is the ability to evade aircraft. Crash retrieval cases are suggestive of fallible hardware. Fast (and slow) walkers are suggestive of origination outside Earth (but within our physical Universe).
Starman,
I love that name as it's my favorite Bowie song. Please don't misunderstand what I am stating here. What I am making a point over is that all we have ARE appearances that "suggest" this or that by an external intelligence, and not necessarily one that has made it clear that they actually possess superiority over us.
For instance, do we honestly know that it was their intent to knock the missiles off line and by doing so demonstrate their advantageous position? Or was that possibly just an electromagnetic bi-product of their technology?
What if they themselves are atomic, or nuclear as we understand it, in nature? Possibly they were just attracted to these areas via curiosity.
What if the intelligence behind the phenomena is not physical in nature, but rather is represented as being discarnate within their technology itself? Ghosts in the machine so to speak, or what we like to buzz as being called "singularity" these days.
That does not make them any more so advanced than us. Just different, and honestly, it points more towards a yet unknown non - typically human intelligence within a larger native environment that we both share, than what we presently understand.
This difference may make for such natural incompatibility that all we can imagine is that they must be so much more advanced than us because they possess these technologies that defy our laws of physics. What if they have no choice?
What if their greatest advancing concern is obtaining physicality for themselves due to some survival based need?
We are the relevant center for such speculations. We find relevance within their demonstrations based on our own limitations, and understandings. This type of understanding leaves a lot to be desired and is more than likely just cause for so many of us to stay on track with regard to these things.
My point is that we look to, and even expect, UFOs to behave as they "should" according to our own paradigms.
The truth is however, they've been acting this way throughout recorded history. Certainly this ongoing human spun enigma did not start this past century. We only now equate UFOs to flight based technologies because that is precisely where we are at with respect to our own scientific awareness and cultural center.
continued:
When you look at the BIG picture, it starts seeming a wee bit too much like Sci Fi to me. Lets go colonize the Universe and some such malarkey. We go looking for facts to fit our pet UFO hypothesis and come up with crash retrieval stories to which there is no bottom.
UFOs are real. A non-human, or possibly proto-human, external agency is involved. Most likely they are from the precise same environment that we share with them and always have since the beginnings of time. Certainly I am not just referring to the rest of the universe here either.
Nothing I have ever seen (read: secondarily) demonstrated within the UFO phenomenon suggests "space travel" apart from the stories that contactees forward.
The UFO (and Fortean considerations in general) all seems to thrive on suggestion however, and that is NOT becoming, nor indicative, of an "advanced" sentient being.
Is not the mission of sentience to effectively announce the identity of the sentient? Seems logical, but possibly I am only personifying here. So far, all I see are a room full of mirrors.
Where is their sentient demonstration, one creature to another? If anything, they seem to be incredibly fearful of us. Operating in the wide open, yet always in unannounced complete secrecy and disregard for us, or sneaking up on us in the middle of the night while we're in bed and scaring us half to death.
It may be quite possible that they themselves possess no more ability to actually interact with humanity anymore than humanity has the ability to interact with them.
Could it be that this has been their mission since day one? I can hear their leaders now: "We will initiate and make contact with the humans ASAP. We estimate it will require approximately 50 million years to do so.
They Greys were most likely engineered for just such a purpose. (longevity) Everything they have shown us so far has certainly "suggested" this. `
I contend that UFOs utilize the medium of our sentient consciousness to interact with us as a species, as well as to physically navigate within the confines of our native physical environment.
This does not mean that they do not use technology. However, they are forms of technology inherent to themselves and their possibly unique being.
I am just stating that for whatever reason, they seem to RELY on suggestion (imagery), rather than direct cognizant interaction and communication with us. Why? For an "advanced" sentient being, that makes ZERO sense, unless...
Oh Jeff. I would probably _disagree_ with your ideas in the 98%.
Come on... knocking out missiles was just a "byproduct" of their technology...strange that only the missiles inside silos were affected. If memory serves, in another case, lasers penetrated bunkers where warheards were stored.
UFO beings from the same environment isn't credible. Given their apparent edge, why are they in the shadows? Where is the evidence for the evolution of a nonhuman intelligent species in the fossil record? Or advanced technology e.g. an aircraft in mesozoic strata? And why are UFO entities almost invariably associated with flying craft, if they are from here? What about fast/slow walkers?
Starman,
I literally answered every question that you raised within my post. A narrow minded view of the UFO issue (read: Star Trek)is precisely why we are going over the same old tired ground with respect to these myriad of phenomena.
Do you have anything of substance apart from Fastwalkers/Slowwalkers/Skinwalkers?
This is my point and there is ZERO denying as much.
Which comic book version of UFOlogy are you getting your "facts" from anyhow?
I have been personally familiar with these terms since Vallee's fictional reference to as much, as well as the ridiculously repetitive video that covers NOTHING new that the ridiculously over HYPED video references.
You or anyone else KNOWS NOTHING for certain concerning UFOs apart from the cultural relevance that human beings have placed on them since the beginnings of our recorded history.
Hello! Is that thing on?
Jeff, There is a clear physicality to UFOs that makes them much more than mere products of human consciousness: show up on radar, show up on film/movies/videos, create spectroscopic images, EM interference (stall car/plane engines, interfere with compasses/radio/TV, cause power blackouts), selectively knock out weapons systems, emit detectable radio waves, burn/damage ground/vegetation, elevated radiation levels, gravimetric effects, sometimes adverse physiological effects on humans/animals such as radiation poisoning, ground depressions, etc.
There certainly have been some good physical evidence/crash retrieval cases. E.g., you can view bits of recovered material from the Hill 611 (Dalnagorsk, Russia) incident in the Atomic Museum in Las Vegas.
Anybody can dream up “out of the box” theories for UFOs. E.g., I could hypothesize that we are nothing but a hyper-computer simulation, therefore there is no physical reality to our universe. UFOs are nothing more than characters inserted into our UniSim game by the programmers or SuperGeeks (AKA "God"). Or I could hypothesize something like the hyperdimensional Q Continuum from Star Trek that can "mentally" manifest anything by merely wishing it. Or I can believe in magic that absolutely anything is possible merely from humans mentally wishing it, including physical manifestation on a massive scale.
Or I can believe there is some sort of definable material "reality" to the one universe we do know about, there could be civilizations other than ours much older than ours that perfected interstellar travel, have colonized the galaxy in an exponential fashion, therefore could now be all over the. They visit and observe us in their advanced physical aircraft/spacecraft for whatever agenda(s), sometimes seen by us and detected by our instruments. Sometimes they are then seen to depart rapidly upward and fade into the sky, suggesting origins beyond Earth. Or just the fact that they are physically real and beyond the capability of any nation on Earth to manufacture suggests non-Earthly origins. This has been the conclusion of a few high-level studies on UFOs, such as the USAF Project Sign, the Swedish investigation of ghost rockets, the more recent French COMETA study.
When the USAF defined the very term "UFO" in 1953, they were referring to real aerial “objects” that defied explanation by their experts and were to be studied for reasons of national security and for their "technical aspects". That does not sound like they considered UFOs simply to be manifestations of the human mind but real, material, technological, physical objects that could be studied and learned from.
In the end, I guess it all comes down to ones evaluation of probabilities. I think the ETH is the most CONSERVATIVE explanation for thousands of baffling cases and given all science knows now about the origins of life and evolution of complex life, not outrageously improbable. There are almost certainly other technological civilizations out there.
Whereas your proposals that UFOs are nothing but manifestations of the human mind, including manifestations of physical effects, or an invisible, immaterial intelligence coinhabiting the planet, I consider to be far more speculative and well beyond anything in present scientific theory.
Maybe the ETH is “100% speculative”, but what you are proposing is more like 10,000% speculative. The ETH is at least testable in principle since it is based in a material reality (quite unlike what you seem to be proposing). If you are in the right place at the right time, you can use instruments to detect them quite apart from human observation. (E.g., Peter Davenport, who runs NUFORC, has been pushing for a passive radar system to gather PHYSICAL proof of their existence.) If they crash, you can pick up the pieces and examine them to your heart’s content. Good luck trying to detect and observe phantoms, hallucinations and invisible, immaterial intelligences that somehow coinhabit planet Earth and play tricks on us.
Jeff,
Another fascinating twist of your "out of the box" theories was that you started presuming that these aliens/strangers were NOT superior to humans.
Then your theory was complemented saying that those ghostly beings had indeed some kind of technology and that they tricked our mind with stuff that we humans would be ready to accept.
Please explain how is it possible that they have some form of unknown technology, know about our mind, and are perfectly able to play trick on us, clueless humans... and yet they are NOT superior to us?
No offense intended, but your theory seems to stem from the mind of a teenager.
Most speculation about alien motives in UFOlogy and sci-fi, as well as the infiltration/hybridization hypothesis being discussed in this thread, assumes that aliens are like us to some degree, and that we could therefore understand or relate to their motives, if they were, say, to invade earth. But what if the aliens are so thoroughly alien that their means, motives, and nature are simply impenetrable to us? I think it would be a remarkable coincidence if, out of all the alien races that might stumble upon our planet, we happened to be visited by life forms very much like ourselves.
Hello Zed:
Your argument is correct if we compare humans with, for example, ants, or bees. Indeed, humans study and manipulate bees for some purposes, and surely the poor bees can't even imagine what are our motives and methods.
However, Zed's argument becomes powerfully against Zed's argument when one look more closely to it:
We indeed have things in common with bees. They are animals like humans, made of organic materials, and that is why the honey they produce is food for us. They have social behavior, perhaps resembling ours in some way, and that is why some humans are interested in studying them.
To further negate Zed's argument, notice that the more similar to humans are the studied or manipulated animals, the more interest they spark in humans. Take as an example the mammals. Mammals are thoroughly studied by humans for medicine purposes. This is because mammals bodies inner working is very similar to humans (yes I know humans are mammals). Many mammals display intelligence (similar to human's) and that is why they are widely adopted as mascots by humans.
On the other hand, many mammals, although they are considerably less smart than humans, have the ability to understand some human motives and intentions. Why would humans be unable to understand at least some of the motives of more advanced civilizations?
In short, DO expect that strangers coming from other planets, interested in planet earth, DO have things in common with us.
Most probably they would share a considerably similar biological evolution with us, and consequently their motives may be search for resources, knowledge, entertainment, and more high level motives related to other species: conservation of biological diversity, benevolence, control of potentially dangerous civilizations, etc.
Yes, we humans still need to learn a lot from the universe and need to learn to be less wild. But we are not so dumb, I think.
I agree Don. What is the lesson of our own solar system? Either there are earthlike conditions or there's no life (at least none we can detect). Assuming life is only possible under similar conditions, similar evolutionary outcomes may be predicted. Look at all the examples of homoplasy on our world. In light of that, reports of roughly similar (humanoid) beings aren't surprising. Likewise their motives should be comprehensible. The ancients would hardly understand our technology but they could easily understand our motives.
If intelligent life exists in the galaxy or nearby, then it is more than likely multiple intelligences have existed millions of years and have known and studied life on planet Earth. Assuming the ability of them to come at will, then there was/is no need to destroy us. They more than likely controlled the "time advantage", since we've been here as humans so recently.
I just think it is very unlikely "we're doomed" by some alien attack, as that would have been done long ago by other means. That assumes, of course, "they" are already here in those ET-Alien UFO's.
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